Happy Birthday, Mother

My Mother will be 80 on Tuesday, the 29th of March. But it'll be difficult for me to celebrate.

On Tuesday, March 8th, 2011 I was informed that my Mother has inoperable breast cancer. An Eastern European nurse let it slip out in my Mother's nursing home. Not great for her either, as she presumed I knew...

This had been known for months, but nobody had bothered to explain things to me. What I presumed was just an infection was, in fact, cancer. Some infection.

A Raft of Incompetence

All these months, after my Mum's stroke, I've been relieved because "at least she hasn't got cancer." I don't know how long my Mother has got left on this Earth, but the British State have made things more difficult for both of us.

Since my Mother's stroke, my lifelong loathing of the 'system' has soared into the stratosphere. I know Americans often view the British as cold. But it's not the people, it's the State itself. Oh, and those public school guys in bowler hats...

When my Mother was discharged from the hospital, I was told on the day of her departure that she was moving into a nursing home. I didn't know that she was terminally ill at this time. How ill do you actually have to be to stay in a British hospital? I wasn't consulted either as to what nursing home my Mother was being sent to. I remember my maternal Grandmother and my Father being damaged by being given the wrong medication, so I've never felt confident about letting the State look after a loved one. The home itself has turned out to be okay, apart from a soft toy I bought Mum at Christmas going missing... But my Mum wants to come home.

I wanted my Mum to stay at home, too, and I was considering becoming a full-time carer to look after her. The social worker had different ideas. I once visited my Mum in her nursing home and she was sobbing uncontrollably. I had never seen her in such an emotional state, and my Mother is an emotional woman. She said, when I visited her recently: "I wish I'd die I'm so miserable." As my friend Orchiolum/Larry said to me, maybe guys like Jimi Hendrix and Kurt Cobain were the lucky ones, dying at full power aged 27.

The breathtaking incompetence of the powers that be in sorting out my Mum's financial affairs has also caused me more stress. Meanwhile, the nursing home adds the interest on the arrears...

Taking on the State

As an only child, single guy with relatives and friends far away, it's been a case of me against the British State. But I can be difficult, as I like those odds. My rebellious teenage punk years have been vindicated by how insufferable and unfeeling the State is. That's true of most 'civilized' countries, I feel. If you let it, the State will steamroller you.

I've no idea how things are going to pan out, as I could either implode or explode. As I told a nurse in a controlled rant at my Mum's nursing home, after hearing that my Mum was dying: "The brown stuff is going to hit the fan."

My Mother wouldn't hurt a fly, and I mean that literally. Any chances of my being convinced by anyone that there is a loving God have evaporated. I respect people's right to believe what they want to believe, but my parents and I always tried to live a life based on expecting no carrot of Heaven at the end of it. I don't believe that any great, benevolent being would inflict the suffering my Mother is going through. The nightmare in Japan is another case in point.

I end this article with slightly better news, as my Mum may be having radiology treatment. But the question needs to be asked: "Why not earlier?" I wake up every morning feeling sick with worry, but, unluckily for the State, people like me are fighting back. Push people too far and there will always be consequences.

Thanks to everyone who has voiced their concern about my Mum's plight.